JudoWolf.com

My wife has had MS for the past twenty years. When she was diagnosis there were no MS drugs available and the disease was very difficult to diagnosis. We have been fortunate over the years as the disease has not ravaged her. The new drugs have been a God send. Over the past twelve years she has been on Avonex and now Tysabri. They have slowed down the progress and limited her exacerbation. Since my wife has had the disease for so long I’m going to break the beginning into three blogs.
It all began in the fall of 1990 we were not married at the time and had been living together for a short time. We were both divorced and each had children from previous marriages. My wife was working as a bank teller. The very first sign was a triple infection she had involving her urinary tract, bladder, and kidneys. It was so severe she was in the bed for two weeks. Once the infection ran its course things were back to normal. She returned to work and all was well for the next six months. We were attending a Baptism and walking along the sidewalk and suddenly she fell down. I helped her up, brushed her off and asked if she was okay. She replied, “Of course. I’m more embarrassed then hurt. My heel must have got caught in a crack.” Looking down at the sidewalk I noticed there were no cracks in it. Funny, at the time I never gave it a second thought. A few months later she was upset when she got home from work and said.”I dropped my coin bag today. Well, it just fell out of my hand and I didn’t even feel it”. After I calmed her down we decided to go see a doctor. This began the doctor odyssey. Over the next year we saw every doctor imaginable and they all said the same thing we cannot find anything. My wife’s frustration level was through the roof and she thought she was going crazy. The falls and dropsy’s continued on and off over the next few months and we were nearing the holidays for 1992. Two weeks before Thanksgiving she collapsed in the bank and was taken to the hospital in an ambulance. The x-rays showed a mass on her spinal column. She was referred to a neurosurgeon that referred her to a neurologist. We had been to a neurologist a year before and he found nothing. This neurologist ordered a battery of test and would notify us when the results were in. He called a week later and we made an appointment. We will never forget the day the neurologist gave us the news that she had MS. After we were seated he came in sat down and said, “All the test results have come back and I’m sorry to inform you that you have MS.” We looked at each other and then my wife said, “Am I going to be one of Jerry’s kid?” A grand smile spread over the doctor’s face and he replied, “No not MD (Muscular Dystrophy), MS (Multiple Sclerosis). They are two separate diseases. Yours will affect your central nervous system. MD attacks the muscles”. We were both relieved she didn’t have MD. The doctor explained how the disease would affect her central nervous system. The thing you must always remember is that MS attacks people in different ways. The one common symptom is fatigue. I have some patients who I see all the time and some who I diagnosis and never see again. There is no way of knowing how this disease will progress. It is a waiting game. Then he said, “Go live your life. Do what you want while you still can.” He gave us some pamphlets about MS. We scheduled another appointment and off we went. I knew the disease was not good but was not familiar with its properties. My wife had no idea what it was, but was relieved she finally knew what she had.
It was a beautiful fall day and when we got to the car we stood outside. After lighting up (We still smoke), we began to talk. What were we going to do? We were in our forties, still had teenagers, my fiancée had a grandson, and we were planning to get married. We were quiet as we finished our smokes. We would have to digest it before we could talk about it further. Sitting in the car I took off my watch looked over at my wife and said, “I won’t need this anymore.” I dropped the watch out the window, started the car and rolled over it. I haven’t worn a watch since. It was a quiet ride home. Little did we know that our lives had just changed forever? To be continued…

With kindest regards, Judowolf